After years of drought, money to finish the job

The English theatre has been saved from erosion. After years of underfunding, leading to fewer productions, smaller casts and the creation of a scrimp and save siege mentality, it can breathe again. Yesterday's news that 194 theatres and companies are going to receive an extra £25m in 2003-04 means that the theatre can plan for growth rather than inexorable decline.

Underfunding, so long the norm, is a tragic waste. It means that too much of the available money has to go on meeting constant costs rather than where it belongs: on the stage. Take two London examples. On current funding the year-old Soho theatre, scene of yesterday's jubilant press conference, can afford to originate two-and-a-half productions a year: by 2003 it will have a 130% grant increase. Likewise the excellent Tricycle theatre in north London has funds to create one-and-a-half home productions a year: in two years time its grant will have shot up by 117%.

The really good news, however, was that almost the entire £25m is to go in core funding: theatres will be given the tools and allowed to finish the job. Only two months ago the rumour was that the arts council was going to keep £8m back and allow regional arts boards to bid for it through various schemes and initiatives. Which would have meant more paperwork, form-filling and wasteful bureaucracy.

Indeed possibly the most cheering thing yesterday was to hear Gerry Robinson, the arts council chairman, declare: "I'm passionately anti-schemes and hate the collection of data we have."

Equally radical is the idea of selective distribution of new money. Some companies, often starting from a modest base, get massive increases: 236% for Battersea arts centre, south London; 381% for the Gate in Notting Hill, west London; 238% for Kommedia in Brighton; and 233% for Theatre by the Lake in Keswick. Others have to make do with more modest advances: a surprisingly low 10% for the enterprising Oxford Stage Company.

But the theatres I feel sorry for are the losers: Croydon, Chester, Worcester and York. It is hard to know what precisely they have done wrong. There also needs to be an open appeals procedure for them to make their case direct to the arts council.

So what happens next? And how should the money be spent? Each theatre and company has its own agenda. But there are several golden rules one would like to see applied across the board. For a start, lower ticket prices and an extension of pay-what-you-can nights. I would also like to see more adventurous programming with an emphasis on new plays and rare classics. There is a dreary myth that audiences only want the tried and trusted. I do not believe it for a moment: coming out of a packed Northern Broadsides King John at the Viaduct in Halifax the other night, it was cheering to hear a teenager say she had never enjoyed a Shakespeare play more.

High on my wish list would also be realistic pay and living expenses for actors and a return to the principle of permanent companies. It is good to see one theatre which has played it the company way, the Colchester Mercury, getting a 120% increase.

One niggling thought occurs. If the Conservatives won the next election would they honour the blood transfusion or would they watch it slowly perish of inanition?